Bottle-washing apparatus.



PATENTED" MAY 23, 1905.

, D.BOYLE. BOTTLE WASHING APPARATUS.

APPLICATION FILED JULY 5. 1904.

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WITNESSES ATTORN EYS PATENT-ED MAY 23, 1905.

BOYLE. BOTTLE WASHING APPARATUS.

APPLICATION FILED JULY 6, 1904 2 SHEETS-SHEET 2.

A ll" l l l-I ATTORNEYS} UNITED STATES Patented. May 190 5,

DAVID BOYLE, OF PATERSON, NEW JERSEY.

BOTTLE-WASHING APPARATUS.

SPECIFICATKON forming part of Letters Patent No. 790,817, dated May 23, 1905.

Application filed uly 5, 1904:. Serial No. 215,419.

To all whom it'- ntay concern:

. Be itknown thatI, DAVID BoYLE,acitizenof the United States, residing in Paterson, in the county of Passaic and State of New Jersey, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Bottle-Washing Apparatus; and I do hereby declare the following to be a full, clear, and exact description of the invention, such as will enable others skilled in the art to which it appertains to make and use the same, reference being bad to the accompanying drawings, and to characters of reference marked thereon, which form a part of this specification.

' My present invention relates to machines for cleansing and sterilizing bottles.

' It has for its principal object to so provide for carrying the bottles through the cleansing and sterilizing solution that all the bottles will be submitted to the same treatment, and thus uniformly good results secured without ref erence, necessarily, to the capacity of the machine, which may be varied according to demand. In order to accomplish this, a wheel is used which dips into a tank containing the solution and which is so constructed as to support all the bottles it carries in precisely the same position with relation to the axis of the wheel. The arrangement is, moreover, such that as the wheel revolves each bottle successively fills itself with and completely empties itself of the solution into which it is submerged by the wheel.

Other objects are to so construct the appa ratus as to make it easily accessible for installing and withdrawing the bottles, easy to manipulate as the bottles are caused to be carried through the solution, and strong, durable, and inexpensive in construction.

The invention will be found fully illustrated in the accompanying drawings, wherein Figure 1 is a view of the apparatus in side Fig. 2 is a View in end elevation Fig. 3 1s elevation. looking from the right in Fig. 1.

a fragmentary sectional view of the wheel, taken at a right angle to its axis; and 'Fig. 4: is a plan of a portion of the wheel looking toward the periphery of the same and showing one of the compartments thereof open.

The tank or vat shown in the drawings comprises supporting-beams a, which rest on the floor, a bottom wall 6, resting on said beams, side walls 0, also resting on said beams, and end walls d, the edges of the latter being set in grooves in the bottom wall and side walls, as shown at e and f in Figs. 1 and 2. Tie-bolts 9 connect the extreme ends of the side walls and hold the same securely together.

it represents stays which penetrate the side walls vertically, thus securing together their component sections if they are made in more than one piece and preventing their being distorted by swelling.

2' is a valve-controlled pipe for admitting water or a solution to the tank, and j is a valve-controlled pipe for admitting steam for heating the water or solution.

is a valve-controlled drain-pipe.

On the side walls 0 of the tank are secured plumber blocks 6, in which is journaled a shaft m, held in place by cap-pieces n, bolted to the plumber-blocks. On this shaft are secured two large disks 0, which are held to rotate together by rigid partitions 19, arranged radially. These partitions only extend a short distance inwardly from the peripheries of the disks toward the shaft 172, thus leaving a clear or open space between their inner ends and the shaft. The joints betweenthem and the disks are both braced and calked by quarterround molding q. The compartments 1" thus formed have their bottom walls 8 foraminous, being preferably formed of heavy wiregauze, which is secured at the edges thereof adjacent the disks 0 to strips t, screwed or otherwise fastened to the disks end to end and having their meeting ends substantially coincident with the radial lines in which the partitionsp are disposed. The peripheral or outer wall a of each compartment is hinged to the outermost edge of one of the partitions p, the hinges 'v'being preferably on corresponding sides of the walls it throughout the series, so that said walls all open in the same direction. Said walls when closed fit snugly into the compartments 9, resting against quarterround molding w, forming stops.

at represents catches which are carried by the walls a and adapted to engage in keepers y, secured to the inside faces of the disks 0.

Each wall a may have one or more holes a to receive the hand for opening it.

1 designates binding-strips on the peripheries of the disks 0, and 2 designates battens for strengthening and preventing the warping of the walls 14.

On the shaft m is secured a ratchet-wheel 3, adapted to be engaged by either or both of two reversely-set pawls I. Thereis also secured on the shaft a crank 5, whereby, when necessary, to manually rotate the structure carried by the shaft.

In operation the tank is first filled with water or any suitable solution and then steam admitted through the pipe to heat the solution up to the sterilizing-point. The level of the water or solution should be at least above the walls of each compartment 0' when the same is in its lowermost position with relationto the shaft on. The bottles are stacked in the compartment next above the top of the tank at the left of the machine as it appears in Fig. 1 successively, head end in, as best seen in Fig. 3, until said compartment is as full as can be. At the same time the alreadytreated bottles are removed from the compartment next above the diametrically opposite compartment. The wheel being kept overbalanced on the left-hand side rotates automatically in the direction of the arrow shown in Fig. 1. As it rotates the compartments on one side are successively filled and those on the other emptied. As each compartment containing bottles to be sterilized enters the solution the solution is admitted thereto through the perforated wall 8 and fills the bottles, and as it leaves the fluid upon the wheel having turned approximately a half-revolution the bottles will begin to gradually empty themselves. By the time the compartment is sufficiently above the horizontal, so that the bottles are completely empty, the compartment is opened and the bottles removed therefrom.

The pawls 4 are useful in completely emptying the Wheel of bottles, as when the machine is put out of operation over night. As it would be too much of a load to lift to turn the wheel at this time in the same direction,

it is turned back and forth alternately, a compartment first on one side and then on the other being emptied until all the bottles are removed. While each compartment is being emptied, one or other of the pawls is placed in engagement with the ratchet.

It will be observed that the wall of each compartment, which is foraminous in order to admit the solution into the compartment, and hence the Weakest,is placed nearest the shaft of the wheel where the weight of the bottles and impacts caused by their moving about as the wheel rotates never affect it, and that all the other walls which are directly subjected to these influences are rigid substantial structures well able to resist them.

Having thus fully described my invention, what I claim as new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is

1. The combination of a tank, a shaft journaled horizontally therein, disksarranged on said shaft, rigid partitions arranged radially with reference to said shaft and joining and bracing said disks, a foraminous wall joining the edge portions of each two partitions which are adjacent theshaft, and a removable wall arranged between each two partitions at the edge portions thereof which are adjacent the peripheries of said disks, substantially as described.

2. The combination of a tank, a shaft journalled horizontallytherein, disks arranged on said shaft, rigid partitions arranged radially with reference to said shaft and joiningand bracing said disks, :1 foraminous'wall joining the edge portions of each two partitions which are adjacent said shaft, and another wall hinged to each of said partitions at the edge portions thereof which are adjacent the peripheries of said disks and adapted to stand between said partition and the next adjacent one, substantially as described.

In testimony that I claim the foregoing I have hereunto set my hand this 1st day of July, 1904:.

DAVID BOYLE.

Witnesses:

JOHN W. STEWARD, ROBERT J. POLLETT. 

